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Thursday, 27 June 2013

Porsche's Le Mans lineup takes shape

Mark Webber confirmed the inevitable today by announcing he is to leave Infiniti Red Bull Racing at the end of the season and move to Porsche's new LMP1 effort for 2014.

The Australian had been expected to make the move for a long time and the speculation hit a new high after the 'Multi 21' fiasco at the Malaysia Grand Prix although the winner if nine grands prix thus fart insists that the dispute with teammate Sebastian Vettel had no bearing on his decision.

Webber will however retain Red Bull backing meaning it is likely that we could see Red Bull branding in yet another international motorsport series.

Red Bull now have a vacancy to fill in one of their world championship winning cars with Kimi Raikkonen hot favourite to line up alongside Vettel. Toro Rosso pair Daniel Ricciardo and Jean-Eric Vergne are also being considered for the seat. A move for either of those two will mark the first time that someone has successfully graduated to Red Bull Racing through the Energy Drinks firm's young driver program since Sebastian Vettel did in 2009.

Joining Webber at Porsche will be Swiss driver Neel Jani. Jani himself formerly with Red Bull as a test and demonstration driver has been competing full time in sports car racing with Rebellion Racing and has driven alongside Nick Heidfeld and Nicolas Prost since 2012, finishing fourth in the WEC last year.

Jani and Webber are the third and fourth drivers confirmed by the Stuttgart manufacturer after Timo Bernhard and Romain Dumas were announced as the first two drivers earlier this year.

The German and the Frenchman have previous experience driving prototypes for Porsche after clinching the American Le Mans Series title in both 2007 and 2008 with Porsche's RS Spyder LMP2 contender.